MER Article Revolutionary Posters and Cultural Signs All revolutions require aesthetic means for representing changes in consciousness. The French Revolution saw itself as something new and universal, and generated a rich elaboration of aesthetic categories of the sublime (storms of nature, volcanoes, earthquakes), the beautiful (island of calm, meado Mehdi Abedi, Michael M.J. Fischer • 6 min read
MER Article Palestinian Expression Inside a Cultural Ghetto During the summer of 1986,1 spent a month in the West Bank, keen to learn for myself about the effects of Israeli restrictions on Palestinian forms of expression, particularly in the visual arts and local crafts. A quick look at different cultural products indicated that traditional aesthetic values Kamal Boullata • 16 min read
MER Article Poems Hey Jeep, Hey Jeep Sami Shalom Chetrit 1. Eight kids in an army jeep Eight soldiers, one major: eight kids and one minor 2. Hey Jeep, Hey Jeep [1] 3. And his son Ishmael was thirteen years old at the cutting of his uncircumcised flesh. 4. And eight of his sons in the army jeep and his son cri Erez Bitton, Shelley Elkayam, Sami Shalom Chetrit • 3 min read
MER Article "Wounded Kinship's Last Resort" Ironically, the latest junkets featuring liberal Israelis and recently domesticated Palestinians threaten to finally collapse the intricate history of Jews and Arabs in the Middle East into two streamlined, easily recognizable blocs: enlightened, idealistic and well-intentioned Zionists (“wounded sp Ammiel Alcalay • 10 min read
MER Article American Magic in a Moroccan Town Fatna held up the knot of hair. It was a magic spell. “But what does it mean?” I asked, looking suspiciously at the neatly-tied brown square knot. “And whose hair is it?” “Why do you think Khadija has been coming over every day? She wants me to marry her brother Muhammad. This is probably her mothe Hannah Davis • 17 min read
MER Article Bedouins, Cassettes and Technologies of Public Culture Discotheques and taxicabs all over Egypt last January were playing the songs of a new pop star. No one knew exactly where “the Earthquake of ’88” (his biographer’s term) had come from, but everyone seemed to think Ali Hemida was a Bedouin. Some said he came from Sinai; others said Libya. His music w Lila Abu-Lughod • 16 min read
MER Article Culture Across Borders Salman Rushdie’s story of Ismail Najmuddin -- the former Bombay lunch-runner turned movie star, screen name Gibreel Farishta, the Muslim who played Hindu gods in numerous “theologicals,” migrant to London, victim of the bombing of flight AI-420, the man who fell from the sky and lived, only to dream Timothy Mitchell • 8 min read
MER Article From the Editors (July/August 1989) The events of the past year demonstrate the great need for independent critical reporting and analysis of the Middle East and US policy there -- reporting and analysis that only Middle East Report provides. The key word is independent. This is what allows Middle East Report to be critical, to speak The Editors • 2 min read
MER Article Primer: Where They Stand I. All states in the region, including a Palestinian state, have the right to independence and security. US / Israel / PLO / Arab States / USSR / EEC States (bold = support; plain text = opposition) (Author not identified) • 2 min read
MER Article Reading an El Al Ad The declaration of the state of Palestine just five days earlier, nearly a year of the intifada, and a paralyzed but uncompromising Israeli politics are the immediate background of the full page El Al advertisement on page 57 of the Sunday New York Times on November 20, 1988. The ad has a rather pec James Faris • 6 min read
